Our Summer Holiday

Bonjour a tous!            

We are back from our hiatus.  It was a hot, dry summer but we managed to make the most of it.  

Stéphane spent six weeks in France seeing family.  Most of it was spent in Normandy cleaning and organizing in preparation for selling the family home.  It was a working vacation. 

His mother is doing well although she is now in assisted living, one that is truly like a home complete with a chat de maison.  She has good days and bad, her memory in and out as Alzheimers takes its toll.  But luckily she loves to socialize with her fellow residents, she gets her hair done on site and the dining room food is quite good.  

Well, it is France after all.

But first things first.  Upon landing in the motherland Stéphane went to see his dentist in Paris near Parc Monceau.  He has been a patient of Dr. Bernard Sitbon for over 30 years and he refuses to see any other dentist.  They are good friends and Stéphane takes a box of truffles to his appointment as a gift.  The best part: it costs about ⅓ of what an American dentist (voleurs!) would charge.

Stéphane took a side trip with his brother Fabien to Belgium in order to visit the manufacturer of one of his chocolate machines (it hasn’t been working as it should and he’s going to get to the bottom of it, even if it means going to Belgium!).  He now has a contact there who will FaceTime him and walk him through adjusting his machine.

Fortunately there was a little time for relaxation at the beach.  Bretagne to be exact: land of crepes and seriously good butter.  Stéphane cooked a lot - lunch and dinner.  Even in Bretagne when he’s supposed to be chilling.  

They did try a few creperies and found a really good one that they returned to more than once.  Crepes are the pancakes of France but very thin and often savory with ham, eggs and cheese as an example.  There are infinite variations and they are truly delicieux.

The weather on the other hand was blistering hot and air conditioning is not that common so it was not good sleeping weather.  Then there were the mosquitos.  If you kept your windows open all day, you must remember to close them by dusk or you would have pesky little visitors.

The beach at least afforded some shade and an ocean breeze.  The water in Bretagne is crystal clear and turquoise but usually quite cold.  This year was no different so Stéphane abstained from swimming.  

Upon Stéphane’s return from France,  we were pleasantly surprised to learn that we won 2 Bronze Awards in the Americas competition from the International Chocolate Awards! Now our Hazelnut Dulce de Leche and our Calvados Caramel will move on to the world competition.

And now he is making chocolate non-stop in preparation for re-opening October 1st just a couple weeks from now.  

You may have noticed our newly designed website?  Same great chocolate but hopefully an easier, better user experience for everyone.  We hope you like it!

We’ve missed you all and hope you enjoyed your summer?  Keep in touch and we’ll be back online October 1st :)

Xoxo Barbara (and Stéphane) Lesaint